Building The Berlin Wall

Berliners awoke on 13th August, 1961 to find their city divided in half. East German troops had worked overnight to roll out barbed wire and barricades, turning neighbourhoods into no-go zones. It became known as ‘Barbed Wire Sunday’ 

Before the wall’s construction, East Germans had been bolting westward at the unsustainable rate of nearly 2,000 a day; notably skilled professionals the East couldn’t afford to lose. 

The Berlin wall stopped the flow of people, but also turned the city into a dystopia, complete with ghost train stations, split families, and a massive fortified structure with a deadly no-man's-land of guard dogs, watchtowers, and landmines. 

In this episode, Arion, Rebecca and Olly discover how the wall wasn’t actually finished until the 1970s; reveal the escape routes travailed by daring civilians; and uncover the “Wall woodpeckers” who took souvenirs home with them when the wall finally fell... 

Further Reading:

• ‘Why the Berlin Wall rose—and how it fell’ (National Geographic, 2019): https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/why-berlin-wall-built-fell

• ‘Berlin Wall History: Everything You Need To Know’ | HistoryExtra: https://www.historyextra.com/period/20th-century/berlin-wall-history-facts-fall-why-built-destroyed-how-long-deaths-killed-graffiti-east-west-life-today/

• ‘The Berlin Wall - How it worked’ (DW Documentary, 2018): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khXGMcX59YE

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The Retrospectors are Olly Mann, Rebecca Messina & Arion McNicoll, with Matt Hill.

Theme Music: Pass The Peas. Announcer: Bob Ravelli. Graphic Design: Terry Saunders. Edit Producer: Ollie Peart

Copyright: Rethink Audio / Olly Mann 2025.

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